901 


* *>*5> 


GOETHE  AND  VICTOR  HUGO:  A COMPARISON. 


created  Goethe.”  It  is  not  often  that  Nature  can  have  had  recourse 
to  Germany  in  her  introspective  moods.  For  the  gift  of  seeing 
things  as  they  are  is  not  essentially  German.  Indeed,  as  a rule, 
Germans  are  inclined  in  their  account  of  the  universe  and  its 
contents  either  to  see  too  much  or  not  enough.  German  critics, 
especially  when  they  write  about  Shakespeare,  are  inclined  to  dis- 
cover far-fetched  meanings  and  hidden  allegories  in  the  simplest 
flights  of  fancy ; and  they  are  apt  to  pass  a sentence  of  unqualified 
blame  on  the  works  in  which  they  are  unable  to  detect  a lurking 
symbolism.  For  instance,  they  admire  Shelley’s  Prometheus  Un- 
bound for  its  philosophy  rather  than  for  its  poetry.  And  in 
criticizing  a poem  such  as  Keats’  La  Belle  Dame  sans  Merci , a Ger- 
man critic  has  been  known  to  say  that  it  contained  no  fundamental 
moral  basis.  One  has  only  to  read  Mr.  Nordau’s  criticisms  of 
poetry  in  Degeneration  to  be  convinced  of  the  existence  of  this 
point  of  view.  Mr.  Nordau  objects  to  there  being  seven  stars 
round  the  head  of  Rossetti’s  “ Blessed  Damosel.”  “ Why  seven  ? ” 
he  asks.  “We  are  seven,”  they  would  no  doubt  have  answered. 
Now,  many  German  critics  would  have  written  pages  to  point 
out  the  reason  of  there  being  seven  stars  round  the  head  of  the 
Blessed  Damosel,  and  not  eight  or  six. 

A Frenchman,  on  the  other  hand,  as  a rule  looks  straight  at  the 
world,  and  tells  us  what  he  sees,  often,  perhaps,  with  less  reserve 
than  one  might  wish.  Goethe  and  Victor  Hugo  vary  somewhat 
from  their  respective  countrymen  in  this  respect.  I do  not  mean 
to  say  that  Goethe  is  not  thoroughly  a German,  or  that  Victor 
Hugo  is  not  ‘ French  of  the  French.’ 

Let  us  abstain  from  the  imperious  condescension  of  telling 
another  country  that  its  most  characteristic  men  of  genius  do  not 
belong  to  it  at  all.  Therefore,  I refrain  from  saying  that  Goethe 
is  either  an  Englishman,  or  practically  an  Englishman,  or  an 
Englishman  in  spirit,  or  an  overrated  discovery  of  the  English, 
or  that  he  is  read  at  a dvantage  in  an  English 


I. 

Nature,”  wrote  Heine,  “ wishing  to  gaze  on  her  reflection. 


translation. 


902 


THE  NATIONAL  REVIEW. 


But  in  Goethe’s  genius,  the  clearness  with  which  he  saw  things, 
his  faculty  of  being  a looking-glass  to  Nature,  is  not,  I think,  an 
essentially  German  characteristic.  At  least,  if  one  quickly  reviews 
in  one’s  mind  the  most  famous  German  authors,  the  last  thing 
they  suggest  to  us  is  a looking-glass.  In  the  same  way  the 
v chaotic  and  extravagant  quality  of  Victor  Hugo’s  imagination  is 
not  specially  characteristic  of  the  French  genius.  It  is  a thing 
far  removed  from  the  qualities  of  Racine,  Lamartine,  or  Guy 
de  Maupassant.  And  although  Victor  Hugo  is,  in  a sense,  an 
elemental  poet,  and  renders,  admirably  some  of  the  larger  as 
well  as  some  of  the  more  exquisite  aspects  of  Nature,  yet  his 
whole  genius  is  not  one  that  reflects  life  with  faithful  accuracy. 
If  Nature  had  any  idea  of  making  a looking-glass  when  she  made 
Victor  Hugo,  it  must  have  been  to  see  what  she  did  not  look  like. 

The  French  christened  Victor  Hugo  a romancist,  whereas  he 
rightly  belongs  to  that  class  of  writers  whom  they  curiously 
enough-christened  realists,  the  class  of  Balzac  and  Zola — the  class 
of  artists  who  begin  in  glory  with  Michael  Angelo  and  end  in  disgrace 
with  Gustave  Dore.  The  distinguishing  sign  of  these  artists  is  that 
they  see  things  as  they  are  not,  or  rather  they  see  them  in  ‘ a glass 
darkly  ’ — the  glass  of  their  own  imagination.  No  woman  quite  re- 
sembles Michael  Angelo’s  ‘ Night,’  no  man  his  c David,’  although, 
as  an  Italian  poet  has  said,  if  the  present  race  of  men  were  exter- 
minated that  statue  would  remain  “ Modello  a Dio  per  un’  altra 
stirpa  umana.”  Balzac  saw  things  through  a sort  of  atmosphere 
of  black  coffee.  People  made  the  mistake  of  calling  him  a realist 
^ because  the  record  of  his  visions  are  so  terribly  convincing.  M. 
Zola  appears  to  notice  certain  striking  features  of  the  landscape 
and  crowds  when  they  are  very  large  ; where  there  is  one  object  he 
seems  to  see  five  hundred;  he  takes  prodigious  pains  to  tell  us 
what  he  does  see,  to  convince  us  that  what  he  sees  is  true,  and  that 
he  sees  everything.  From  an  artistic  point  of  view  he  fails  in  the 
endeavour,  since  he  chooses  and  lays  stress  on  the  unessential,  and 
is  entirely  lacking  in  the  sense  of  proportion.  He  has,  however, 
the  qualities  of  his  defects  in  an  extraordinary  degree,  and  the 
result  is  that  we  obtain  the  impression  of  a vast  and  confused 
panorama,  often  overwhelmingly  impressive  in  its  background,  but 
uninteresting  in  its  foreground,  which,  as  is  the  case  in  panoramas, 
is  supplemented  with  real  earth  and  strewed  with  lay  figures  stuffed 
with  straw.  Victor  Hugo  sees  the  universe  through  an  enchanted 
mist.  But  he  does  not  break  down  in  the  recording  of  his  visions. 
For  distinctness  of  effect  and  sureness  of  -touch  he  might  be  com- 
pared to  an  etcher.  His  work  might  be  put  with  Blake’s  illustra- 
tions to  the  Book  of  Job — often  sublime,  sometimes  ridiculous, 
sometimes  sublime  and  ridiculous,  above  all  things  imaginative. 


( V<?7 'y'o  ^ 


GOETHE  AND  VICTOR  HUGO:  A COMPARISON  903 


V> 


A 


II. 

If  a plebiscite  were  taken  among  cultivated  people  as  to  which 
was  the  greatest  poet,  Goethe  or  Victor  Hugo,  I think  there  can  be 
no  doubt  that  Goethe  would  come  out  at  the  top  of  the  list  by  an 
overwhelming  majority.  On  the  other  hand,  if  a plebiscite  were  to 
be  taken  among  the  same  people  as  to  whether,  if  starting  for  a 
desert  island,  they  would  take  with  them  the  works  of  Goethe 
or  Victor  Hugo,  one  can  safely  say  that  Victor  Hugo  would  be 
victorious.  The  inference  is  that,  although  the  name  of  Goethe 
is  held  in  higher  repute,  the  works  of  Victor  Hugo  are  read  with 
greater  pleasure;  or,  at  least,  that  a greater  portion  of  Victor 
Hugo’s  works  is  read  with  pleasure  than  of  the  works  of  Goethe. 

The  question  then  arises,  outside  of  Germany,  how  much  of  the 
bulk  of  Goethe’s  poetical  work  is  known  at  all  ? 

The  cynical  might  answer  Gounod’s  Faust. 

Let  us,  however,  take  for  granted  that  Goethe’s  Faust  is  as  much 
read  as  it  should  be  ; besides  Faust , what  other  poetical  writings  of 
Goethe  are  read  ? 

Goethe’s  most  important  poetical  work,  after  Faust , is  generally 
considered  to  be  ljphigenie  auf  Tauris,  a play  which  is  very  much 
admired  in  Germany,  and  not  without  its  English  admirers  ; but  it 
cannot  be  said  that  it  is  either  a great  play  or  a great  poem,  for  as- 
a play  it  is  essentially  undramatic,  and  as  a poem  it  lacks  vitality 
and  inspiration,  in  spite  of  its  dignity  of  style  and  of  occasional 
felicitous  phrases. 

Hermann  und  Dorothea  is  a work  loved  by  all  true  Germans.  It 
is  no  doubt  a charming  idyll.  But  it  is  difficult  for  anyone  who  is 
not  a German  born  and  bred  to  understand  how,  except  for  the  fact 
of  its  being  written  in  hexameters,  it  can  possibly  be  called  poetry,, 
or  what  it  would  have  lost  by  being  written  in  prose.  The  poetry 
of  mortals  may  be  their  daily  prose,  as  Mr.  Meredith  has  said,  but 
if  a poet  wishes  to  reveal  this  fact  in  an  epic,  the  epic  must  strike 
one  as  being  poetry  ; otherwise  its  existence  is  not  justified. 

After  these,  Goethe’s  most  important  poetical  works  consist  of 
Tasso,  Egmont,  Goetz  von  Berlichigen,  and  the  Lyrical  Poems.  The 
greatest  admirer  of  Goethe  would  hardly  say  that  if  Goethe’s  repu- 
tation rested  solely  on  Tasso,  Egmont,  and  Goetz,  that  he  would  be 
considered  more  than  one  of  the  creditable  German  minor  poets,, 
such  as  Lenau  or  Korner. 

There  remain  Faust  and  the  Lyrical  Poems.  Now,  the  question 
arises,  does  Faust-,  together  with  Goethe’s  Lyrical  Poems,  entitle 
him  to  rank  among  the  greatest  poets,  to  be  with  Virgil  and  Dante 
and  Shakespeare  at  an  immeasurable  distance  from  Victor  Hugo, 
Heine,  Leopardi,  and  Keats  ? My  contention  is  that  Faust , great 
poem  as  it  is,  does  not  quite  achieve  this,  that  the  German  genius 


‘904 


THE  NATIONAL  REVIEW. 


Jr 


corresponding  to  Shakespeare,  Virgil,  and  Dante,  is  Beethoven  or 
Bach  or  Wagner,  and  not  Goethe. 

One  can  safely  say  that  many  people  have  read  Goethe’s  Faust , 
and  the  fact  that  even  after  reading  it  they  admire  it,  testifies  to 
the  merit  of  the  work,  as  no  book  has  such  a glamour  about  it  as 
Faust : the  very  name  suggesting,  as  it  does,  all  the  fascinations  of 
romance,  magic,  mystery,  raises  the  highest  expectations.  These 
high  expectations  of  admiration  are  fulfilled,  but  probably  in  an 
unexpected  fashion.  We  do  not  get  what  we  expected — I am 
speaking  of  English  readers  acquainted  with  German,  and  as  yet 
unacquainted  with  Faust. 

We  probably  expect,  especially  if  we  have  read  Marlowe’s 
Faustus,  the  tale  of  an  immortal  soul  bartered  away  for  a life  of 
ecstasy,  and  the  tragedy  of  the  thirst  for  all  knowledge  and  the 
desire  for  all  pleasure  satisfied  and  yet  insatiable.  What  we 
do  get  is  merely  a hint  of  this : the  foundation  of  such  a story, 
the  premisses  of  the  question.  Let  us  first  look  at  it  from  the  point 
of  view  of  the  Advoeatus  diaboli. 

Faust,  saturated  and  sated  with  the  jurisprudence,  philosophy, 
and  medicine,  sells  his  soul  to  the  devil  in  exchange  for  youth,  on 
the  condition  that  he  shall  experience  so  rapturous  a moment 
that  he  shall  wish  it  to  linger  for  ever.  He  is  resolved  not  to  know, 
but  to  live.  And  he  desires  that  as  heaven  ‘ has  robbed  him  of 
immortal  things,  hell  may  this  little  moment  mercifully  give.’  It 
is  not  until  the  end  of  the  second  part  of  Faust  that  the  moment 
is  granted,  and  then  Faust’s  rapture  takes  the  form  of  philanthropic 
enthusiasm.  On  this  ground  the  devil  is  defrauded  of  Faust’s  soul, 
and  loses  the  game,  as  he  always  does,  and  as  is  always  the  case  when 
the  clever  vicious  make  bargains  with  the  guileless.  What  we  get 
is  an  episode  : a love  story  simple  and  impure,  of  which  the  heroine 
is  not  Helen  of  Troy,  but  an  ingenuous  village  maiden,  stupid  beyond 
her  years. 

Stated  in  plain  words,  the  episode  consists  of  a vulgar  seduction ; 
a fait  divers ; it  is  presented  to  us  in  a series  of  disjointed  scenes 
which  derive  infinite  charm  and  beauty  from  the  character  of 
Gretchen,  a creation  of  exquisite  simplicity,  which  the  most  bitter 
adversary  must  own  at  once  puts  Goethe  in  the  same  rank  as 
George  Eliot  and  George  Sand. 

The  things  Gretchen  says  contain  “ de  ces  traits  de  nature  que 
nous  disons  le  cornble  de  Vart  quand  Vart  a le  bonheur  de  les 
trouver .”  For  simplicity  and  pathos  they  are  beyond  the  range  of 
praise,  so  that  if  Shakespeare  had  merely  written  the  scenes  where 
Ophelia  appears,  Goethe  might  fairly  be  placed  on  the  same  level  as 
Shakespeare.  But  as  soon  as  the  episode  ends  with  a case  of  child 
murder  the  poem  is  ended.  The  moral  question  of  the  play,  as  to 


GOETHE  AND  VICTOR  HUGO:  A COMPARISON.  905 


Faust’s  soul,  is  not  solved  at  all.  It  is  true  that  a solution  is  offered 
in  the  second  part  of  Faust ; but  the  second  part  of  Faust  is  a 
totally  different  work,  written  some  time  after  Goethe’s  intellectual 
faculties  had  begun  to  decay,  and  a long  time  after  his  poetical 
faculties  had  ceased  to  exist.  It  is  universally  admitted  by  Germans 
to  be  unintelligible ; M,  Emile  Faguet,  however,  is  fortunate  in  being 
able  to  enjoy  it  enormously. 

Apart  from  the  scenes  where  Gretchen  appears,  there  are  several 
fine  speeches  and  some  amusing  scenes,  several  rather  smart  lines, 
and  a quantity  of  popular  platitudes  neatly  expressed.  It  may  be 
objected  that  something  has  only  to  be  well  enough  said  for  it  to 
become  a platitude  in  time.  But  the  platitudes  in  Faust  are  not 
of  that  kind. 

When  Montaigne  said  that  to  say  a man  was  a liar  was  to  say  that 
he  was  a ‘ brave  man  towards  God  and  a coward  towards  man,’  he 
said  something  which  threw  a new  light  on  the  subject,  and  the 
phrase  will  still  strike  every  reader  who  comes  across  it  for  the 
first  time  as  a sudden  illumination  ; but  when  Mephistopheles  says 
that  in  order  that  others  should  have  confidence  in  you,  you  must 
have  confidence  in  yourself,  or  that  each  individual  can  only  learn 
what  he  can  learn,  we  feel  that  we  are  listening  to  sentiments  which 
must  of  necessity  have  been  expressed  since  language  was  first 
heard. 

It  has  sometimes  been  said  that  Goethe’s  Mephistopheles  is  a 
profound  creation,  and  he  has  even  been  compared  to  Hamlet.  But 
place  him  near  Iago,  and  he  seems  to  diminish  ; to  be  the  same  in 
kind  and  less  in  degree,  whereas  he  should  be  greater  in  kind.  His 
devilishness  appears  almost  cheap  beside  the  cynicism  of  Iago. 
One  imagines  that  a being  so  refinedly  corrupt  might  have  found 
more  amusing  manifestations  of  vice  than  Auerbach’s  cellar  and 
the  dreary  revels  of  the  Walpurgisnacht ! 

Yet  Mephistopheles  is  no  doubt  an  exceedingly  effective  character 
in  the  play.  He  is  a great  and  striking  personality,  impressive  not 
so  much  on  account  of  what  he  says  as  oo^account  of  what  he  is. 
In  addition  to  this  he  strikes  one  as  a witty  and  amusing  man  of 
experience  and  much  savoir-faire , especially  in  his  scenes  with  the 
school-boy.  He  is,  in  fact,  an  ‘ affable,  familiar  ghost  ’ ; but  surely 
Mephistopheles  should  be  something  more  than  that.  Goethe’s 
Mephistopheles  is  a sceptic  of  this  world,  he  is  a part  of  Goethe 
himself ; but  is  not  the  Prince  of  Darkness,  and  consequently  not 
a gentleman.  Compared  with  Marlowe’s  sad  and  terrible  Mephis- 
tophilis  he  appears  singularly  shallow,  and  one  blushes  to  think 
how  inadequately  he  would  have  sustained  a conversation  with 
Milton’s  Satan. 

To  sum  up  for  the  devil’s  advocate,  Faust  can  be  attacked  with 


906 


THE  NATIONAL  REVIEW. 


the  very  weapons  of  Germany.  It  has  no  consistent  moralische 
T idee,  no  fundamental  idea  running  all  through  it.  Assailed  by  the 
weapons  of  France  it  can  be  said  that  it  has  no  artistic  cohesion, 
that  it  is  merely  a collection  of  disjointed  scenes,  a rambling  work 
defaced  with  glaring  errors  of  taste. 

Madame  de  Stael  has  said  that  it  is  ridiculous  to  suppose  that 
Goethe  was  not  aware  of  the  faults  of  taste  of  which  the  play 
0 might  be  accused,  but  that  it  would  be  curious  to  know  what 
motives  he  might  have  had  in  letting  them  stand,  or  rather  in 
framing  them  at  all.  The  theory  that  Goethe  deliberately  de- 
faced his  play  with  sins  of  taste  certainly  does  not  tally  with  all 
we  know  of  his  character ; on  the  other  hand,  if  he  was  conscious 
of  these  errors  of  taste  and  incapable  of  removing  them,  the  fact 
points  to  artistic  incompetency. 

Let  us  now  leave  the  devil’s  advocate  and  go  over  to  the  other 
side.  Perhaps  the  element  in  Faust  which  has  proved  most  fas- 
cinating, and  evoked  the  greatest  admiration,  is  its  intellectual 
atmosphere.  Faust  is  perhaps  the  most  suggestive  work  ever 
written.  It  is  saturated  with  a restless  modernity.  It  is  the 
poem,  above  all  others,  which  reflects  and  expresses  the  intellec- 
tual A nschauung  of  the  nineteenth  century.  The  nineteenth  century 
saw  itself  in  Faust  as  in  a looking-glass,  and  was  thrilled  to  find 
itself  so  interesting.  It  had  been  craving  to  have  its  ‘ hopes  and 
fears,  beliefs  and  disbelieving  ’ expressed.  Byron  attempted  to  do 
it,  but  got  no  farther  than  the  outward  apparatus  and  a melo- 
dramatic mise-en- scene. 

But  Goethe  in  writing  Faust  struck  the  exact  note  required.  He 
gave  full  and  perfect  expression  to  the  etat  d’dme  of  the  nineteenth 
century.  Whether  this  makes  Faust  a greater  poem  is  question- 
able. Here,  indeed,  lies  the  difference  between  Faust  and  Hamlet 
Hamlet  expresses  the  moods  of  the  nineteenth  century  as  much 
as  the  moods  of  any  century  need  expression.  If  Faust  reflects 
more  especially  the  character  of  one  epoch,  this  is  rather  a defect 
than  a quality ; it  means  that  Faust  is  for  an  age  more  than  for  all 
times.  Emerson  complains  of  this,  and  finds  Faust  too  modern. 

To  be  able  to  diagnose  and  reflect  this  ‘ strange  disease  of 
modern  life  ’ to  be — and  Matthew  Arnold  actually  called  Goethe 
‘ the  great  physician  of  the  age  ’ — is  no  slight  thing,  but  it  brings 
Goethe  not  an  inch  nearer  to  Virgil,  Dante,  and  Shakespeare. 

On  this  side,  therefore,  we  have  the  poetry  of  Gretchen  and  the 
suggestiveness  of  the  ideas.  It  may  be  said,  too,  that  the  more  one 
reads  Faust , the  more  striking  it  appears,  the  more  it  grows  upon 
one,  till  at  last  we  regard  and  judge  it  not  as  a fabric  of  art,  but  as 
one  of  Nature’s  secluded  haunts  in  forest,  valley,  mountain,  or 
bay[:  barren  and  somewhat  desolate ; unimpressive  at  first  sight, 


GOETHE  AND  VICTOR  HUGO  : A COMPARISON . 907 


devoid  of  obvious  attractions,  and  yet  a spot  which,  after  a time, 
inspires  the  traveller  who  revisits  it  with  a certain  awe,  and  with  a 
feeling  of  mystery,  although  nothing  seems  to  be  hidden ; with  a 
sense  of  harmony  in  its  very  incompleteness  and  ruggedness — 
which,  in  spite  of  manifestations  of  restlessness  in  tree,  wave,  or 
wind,  is  yet  a place  of  peace. 

Yet,  in  spite  of  its  magnetic  atmosphere,  in  spite  of  its  beautiful 
passages,  it  cannot  be  said  that  Faust  as  an  achievement  is  as  great 
as  the  plays  of  Shakespeare  or  Sophocles,  the  poems  of  Virgil  and 
of  Dante ; and  nobody  has  ever  dreamt  of  saying  any  such  thing 
about  Goethe’s  remaining  works.  Why  then  is  Goethe  ranked 
with  Shakespeare  and  with  Dante  ? 

III. 

If  we  put  Goethe  and  Victor  Hugo  into  the  balance,  and  weigh 
them  on  their  poetic  merits  they  seem  to  complement  one  another. 

At  first  sight  we  might  be  tempted  to  say  that  Victor  Hugo  was 
the  very  type  of  the  bard,  the  Vates,  the  visionary,  and  Goethe  the 
poet-artist,  the  Poeta. 

But  Victor  Hugo  was  Poeta  as  much  as  Vates : he  was  a seer 
who  made  poetry ; Goethe  was  a thinker  who  did  the  same. 

Goethe  certainly  did  not  possess  the  muses’  madness,  without 
which,  Plato  tell  us,  no  one  may  enter  the  temple  of  poets.  His 
poetry,  as  Wordsworth  said,  is  never  inevitable;  his  lyrics  are 
without  the  lyrical  cry. 

What  is  it,  then,  that  we  find  in  Goethe  the  poet  ? Why  is 
he  such  a great  poet  ? Why  is  he  a poet  at  all?  It  is  this  : In 
certain  passages  of  Faust , that  is,  in  the  scenes  between  Faust  and 
Gretchen,  and  in  a few  of  his  lyrics,  when  Goethe  not  only  thought 
but  felt,  his  utterances  reach  that  pitch  of  simplicity  where  style 
disappears  and  only  perfection  is  left — that  simplicity  which  is 
found  in  old  Volkslieder  and  Sagas,  or  which  may  be  the  outcome 
of  the  most  consummate  art  in  the  concealment  of  art. 

In  Goethe’s  case  it  is,  of  course,  the  outcome  of  art : a deliberate 
simplicity,  a wistful  note  of  brooding  pensiveness,  like  the  tone  of  a 
violoncello,  that  possesses  indescribable  charm. 

We  find  it  in  such  lines  as  these,  in  which  Gretchen  speaks  to 
Faust : — 

“ Denkfc  ihr  an  mich  ein  Augenblickchen  nur, 

Ich  werde  Zeit  genug  an  Euch  zu  denken  liaben,” 

or 

Sie  horen  niclit  die  folgenden  Gesange. 

“ Die  Seelen,  denen  icli  die  ersten  sang.” 

We  find  it  again  in  such  lyrics  as  the  Wanderers  Nachtlied , 
Nur  wer  die  Sehnsucht  Jcennt , Meine  Rule  ist  hin,  Gefunden,  and 
in  the  harper’s  song  in  Wilhelm  Meister,  Wer  nie  sein  Prod  mit 


r 


908 


THE  NATIONAL  REVIEW. 


Thranen  ass,  which  must  take  a very  high  place  among  philo- 
sophical poems,  as  it  contains  in  eight  lines  the  whole  philosophy 
of  determinism.  In  poems  such  as  these  we  meet,  indeed,  with 
‘ thoughts  that  breathe/  and,  perhaps,  that  is  the  most  fitting  de- 
scription that  we  could  give  of  Goethe’s  poems  at  their  best. 

These  poems  are,  unfortunately,  exceedingly  few  in  number 
There  are  at  the  outside  a dozen  lyrics  of  Goethe  which  reach  this 
high  level,  whereas  all  the  rest  of  his  lyrical  work  stands  at  a great 
distance  below  this  level,  and  consists  of  poems  that  are  artificial, 
totally  uninspired,  and  uninteresting.  Here  is  an  example  which 
is  to  be  found  in  all  German  anthologies : — 

Willst  du  immer  welter  schweifen  ? 

Sieh,  das  Gute  liegt  so  nali. 

Lerne  nur  das  Gluck  ergreifen, 

Denn  das  Gliick  ist  immer  da. 

It  is  clear  that  this  is  a rhymed  aphorism,  and  by  no  stretch  of 
imagination  could  be  called  poetry. 

Even  in  Mignon’s  beautiful  and  adventurous  song  we  find  a line 
such  as : 

“ Es  glanzt  der  Saal,  es  schimmert  das  Gemach,” 
which  is  undoubtedly  stiff  and  unpoetical,  if  not  vulgar  ; and 
Goethe’s  average  lyrics  are  composed  almost  entirely  of  lines  of 
this  quality.  In  spite  of  this  the  notes  of  pathos  in  Faust  and  the 
few  lyrical  masterpieces  form  an  amply  sufficient  claim  for  Goethe 
to  take  rank  among  the  great  poets,  with  Euripides,  Leopardi, 
Keats,  and  Heine,  but  not  assuredly  a high  enough  claim  for  him 
to  rank  with  the  great  fixed  stars  of  the  poetical  Heaven,  with 
Shakespeare,  Dante,  and  Virgil. 

The  chief  fault  we  find  in  Goethe’s  poetry  is  a want  of  poetical 
imagination.  In  all  his  works  there  is  not  a trace  of  the  alchemic 
power  of  poetry  that  touches  words  and  turns  them  into  gold,  into 
‘ something  rich  and  strange/  which  fuses  imagery,  thought,  and 
sound  into  a clear  flame,  so  that  the  result  is  ‘ not  a fourth  sound, 
but  a star.’  This  is  not  a quality  that  Germans  admire  very  much  ; 
and  yet  we  find  it  in  the  finest  poetry  of  other  countries,  in  a line 
of  Dante’s  such  as  : 

“ Nella  faccia  quale 

Par  tremolando  mattutina  Stella.  ” 

or  in  Shakespeare’s 

“ The  multidinous  seas  incarnadine.” 

or  in  Victor  Hugo’s 

“Des  avalanches  d’or  s’ecroulaient  dans  Pazur.” 

Now,  if  we  turn  to  Victor  Hugo  and  examine  his  poetry,  we  shall 
find  he  possesses  exactly  those  qualities  which  Goethe  lacked,  and 
thus  complements  him. 

As  I have  already  said,  it  is  tempting  to  define  Victor  Hugo 
as  the  typical  bard.  It  is  probably  in  this  character  that  he 


GOETHE  AND  VICTOR  HUGO:  A COMPARISON.  909 

appears  to  most  of  us ; but  the  prophetic  mantle  of  Victor  Hugo  is 
to  his  real  genius  as  stage  accessories  are  to  a play  of  Shake- 
speare’s. Divest  him  of  the  illusions  he  had  as  to  his  importance 
as  a man  of  action  and  as  a politician — illusions  which  were  magni- 
fied and  intensified  by  his  prodigious  imagination — and  you  have 
left  an  artist  as  conscious  and  as  deliberate  as  Giotto  drawing  his 
circle  or  as  Monsieur  Joseph  carving  a wild  duck. 

But  so  far  from  his  genius  being  diminished  on  this  account,  it 
is  thereby  doubly  powerful,  for  not  only  was  he  gifted  with  the 
most  frenzied  inspiration,  he  had  also  the  faculty  of  controlling  it ; 
he  rode  Pegasus  when  that  animal  was  in  its  mostundisciplinedmood, 
with  the  most  unrelenting  of  curbs  and  with  the  surest  of  hands. 

I will  quote  one  example  of  this  double  quality  of  imagination 
under  direction : — 

“ Tout  reposait  dans  Ur  et  dans  Jerimadeth  ; 

Les  astres  emaillaient  le  ciel  profond  et  sombre  ; 

Le  croissant  fin  et  clair  parmi  ces  fieurs  de  l’ombre 
Brillait  a l’occident,  et  Ruth  se  demandait. 

Immobile,  ouvrant  i’aul  a moitie  sous  ses  voiles, 

Quel  dieu,  quel  moissonneur  de  l’eternel  6te 
Avait,  en  s’en  allant,  negligemment  jete 
Cette  faucille  d’or  dans  le  champ  des  etoiles.” 

Victor  Hugo’s  poetic  qualities  are  therefore  first  and  foremost 
(what  Goethe  entirely  lacked)  poetical  imagination,  which  he 
possessed  in  the  very  highest  degree  possible.  No  other  poet 
of  this  century,  except  perhaps  Coleridge,  saw  such  visions,  and 
presented  them  in  such  a definite  form.  His  vision  is  equally 
penetrating  as  regards  what  he  actually  saw  and  what  he 
imagined : and,  as  a carved  crystal,  his  genius  reflected  every  ray 
and  colour  of  nature  in  the  rainbows  of  its  facets  ; again,  as  an 
echoing  dome  it  vibrated  and  re-echoed  to  the  sounds  and  voices 
of  the  universe.  Nature  plays  on  him,  and  at  the  same  time  he 
interprets  Nature;  so  that  he  is  less  like  a passive  JEolian  harp 
on  which  the  winds  play  than  the  bow,  to  which  Nature,  as  he  says 
in  one  of  his  poems,  is  the  harp : — 

La  nature  est  la  grande  lyre, 

Et  le  poete  est  l’archet  divin.  ” 

He  is  the  Wagner  of  poetry,  in  whose  soul  the  mysterious  voices 
of  Nature  reverberate,  and  he  expresses  the  elemental  secrets  of 
sky  and  sea,  of  forest  and  fire,  of  dawn  and  the  sunrise,  of  dusk 
and  the  stars,  in  a multitudinous  orchestration  in  which  each  in- 
dividual evolution  is  subordinated  to  and  dominated  by  one  ruling 
mind.  Compared  with  this  army  of  instruments,  the  poems  of 
Goethe  resemble  the  rare,  deliberate  melodies  of  an  accomplished 
but  unequal  violinist,  who  at  times  achieves  the  utmost  perfection 
in  the  richness  and  purity  of  his  tone. 


62 


910 


THE  NATIONAL  REVIEW . 


In  addition  to  his  imaginative  power,  Victor  Hugo’s  two  prin- 
cipal qualities  are  perhaps  his  unsurpassed  lyrical  faculty  and 
his  sense  of  pathos,  of  the  Idchrimce  rerum.  He  seldom  thought,  but 
he  felt,  and  more  generously  than  did  Goethe ; he  experienced 
not  only  sadness  and  melancholy,  but  a profound  and  all-embracing 
pity  for  human  beings,  the  rich  pity  of  Virgil  for  mortal  things. 

As  to  his  lyrical  gift,  he  far  surpasses  Goethe  in  this  province, 
since  he  has  expressed  a wider  range  of  emotions,  as  deep  in  song, 
as  musical  in  quality,  and  as  perfect  in  form,  in  spite  of  the 
German  language  being  probably  better  adapted  to  lyrical  poetry 
than  the  French.  Goethe’s  lyric  lyre  had  but  practically  one 
string,  the  reflective ; Victor  Hugo’s  has  a thousand ; he  ‘ wakes 
to  ecstacy  the  living  lyre.’  First  and  foremost  he  strikes  a note 
of  passion  which  Goethe  never  knew.  If  Goethe  has  ‘ the  thoughts 
that  breathe,’  then  Victor  Hugo  has  the  ‘ words  that  burn,’  ‘ the 
wonder  and  the  wild  desire,’  in  such  lyrics  as  “ Gastibelza,” 
“ Le  Chasseur  Noir,”  “ Puisqu’ici  bas  toute  ame.” 

The  “Chanson  d’Eviradnus  ” in  La  Legende  des  Siecles  seems 
to  possess  every  quality  a true  lyric  is  capable  of  possessing,  and 
just  as  Victor  Hugo  could  never  have  touched  Goethe’s  grave 
note  that  sets  in  ihotion  endless  vibrations  of  thought,  no  more 
could  Goethe  have  attained  to  the  winged  passion,  the  grace,  the 
freshness,  the  delicacy,  that  are  in  this  song,  the  prismatic  splendour, 
the  iridescent  texture  as  of  a dragon-fly  or  a nautilus  shell,  or  of 
some  fugitive  being  made  of  ‘ spirit,  fire,  and  dew.’ 

Again,  in  a great  many  of  his  lyrics  we  find  a childlike  simplicity 
and  tenderness  of  the  kind  we  find  in  the  poems  of  Catullus ; here, 
as  in  the  case  of  Michael  Angelo,  ‘ out^olilie.sLrong  ^coines  forth 
^sweetness.’  The  slight  lyrics  of  Hugo  have  the  intangible  charm 
of  a spray  of  surf  or  of  a thread  of  dew-drops,  and  they  are  as  dis- 
tinct and  delicate  in  outline  as  a crocus.  Cases  in  point  are  the 
poem  which  begins  “ Elle  etait  pale,  mais  pourtant  rose,”  and  nearly 
all  the  lyrics  in  Les  Contemplations. 

As  to  Victor  Hugo’s  second  great  gift,  his  sense  of  pathos, 
it  is  here,  perhaps,  that  his  true  greatness^  lies : in  his  poems 
on~~children,  on  tfie  poor,  the  suffering  and  sorrowful,  the  captive 
and  the  conquered,  and  all  those  who  are  desolate  and  oppressed. 
His  poem  on  the  death  of  his  daughter,  entitled  A Villequier, 
is  the  natural  language  of  grief,  and  the  Tristesse  d'Olympio, 
as  in  the  English  language  Gray’s  Elegy , which  is  generally  ad- 
mitted by  French  critics  to  be  one  of  the  four  greatest  love  poems 
in  the  French  language,  is  the  most  perfect  utterance  of  the  sad- 
ness that  hangs  about  the  memory  of  happy  times,  the  melancholy 
fragrance  of  ‘ rose  leaves,  when  the  rose  is  dead.’ 

To  sum  up,  Goethe  was  a thinker;  he  always  thought  and 


GOETHE  AND  VICTOR  HUGO  : A COMPARISON . 911 


sometimes  felt,  and  to  the  moments  when  he  felt  we  owe  the 
power  and  pathos  of  Faust  and  the  few  lyrical  masterpieces ; he 
cast  his  thoughts  and  feelings  into  verse,  which  at  times  reaches 
the  level  of  perfect  beauty.  Victor  Hugo  was  a wizard,  who  not 
only  beheld  ineffable  visions  and  heard  voices  denied  to  mortals, 
but  was  endowed  with  all  the  craft  and  cunning  of  a Merlin,  and 
was  able  to  make  his  infinite  dreams  visible  in  concrete  jewels  or 
in  impalpable  shapes  and  textures  as  of  fairy  soap-bubbles.  And 
just  as  Wagner  can  shatter  our  nerves  with  the  tragedy  of  the 
fall  of  Valhalla,  with  the  love  and  death  of  Tristan  and  Isolde,  or 
entrance  us  with  the  rustic  notes  of  a shepherd’s  pipe  or  the  call 
of  a horn  in  a wood,  so  can  Victor  Hugo  distil  his  rapture  or 
sorrow  into  a dew-drop  of  song  as  simple  as  a tear,  or  weave  for 
us,  as  in  La,  Legende  des  Siecles,  out  of  the  harmonies  of  wind  and 
wave,  out  of  the  ‘ gloom  of  earthquake  and  eclipse,’  phantasmagorias 
of  light  and  sound,  of  cloud  and  flame.  Like  Shelley’s  Pan, 

“ He  sang  of  the  dancing  stars, 

He  sang  of  the  daedal  earth.” 

Consequently,  if  the  first  qualities  of  poetry  are  ima^inatkat  and 
music,  as  Mr.  Swinburne  contends — passion,  emotion,  and  vision 
expressed  in  song, — the  poet  of  La  Legende  des  Siecles , Les  Chdti- 
ments,  and  Les  Contemplations  must  rank  above  the  creator  of 
Faust.  On  the  other  hand,  if  criticism  of  life,  philosophy,  and 
suggestiveness  are  the  true  important  factors,  then  Goethe  is  im- 
measurably the  greater  poet.  The  question  is  whether  it  is  the 
greater  thing  for  a poet  to  have  soared  high  into  heavens  of  music 
and  passsion,  or  to  have  dived  deep  into  the  grey  seas  of  reason  : 
into  these  seas  Victor  Hugo  never  dived,  and  into  those  heavens 
Goethe  certainly  never  soared. 

IV. 

In  the  creative  work  of  both  Goethe  and  Victor  Hugo  the  chief 
fault  is,  perhaps,  the  same,  although  it  is  manifested  in  totally 
different  ways — namely,  a want  of  the  sense  of  proportion.  With 
Victor  Hugo  it  took  the  effect  of  confusing  the  great  witjajJae 
grandiose,  and  the  grandiose  with  the  ^puerile^  in  lac pH  frequent 
transitions  from  the^mblime  Jm jLe^idj^  With  Goethe  it 

expressed  itself  in  a want  of  concentration,"^  diffuseness,  an  in- 
curable incompleteness.  Goethe’s  work  often  resembles  his  own 
famous  comparison  about  Hamlet.  It  is  a tree  planted  in  a flower- 
pot : the  tree  grows  and  the  flower-pot  is  shattered. 

Victor  Hugo’s  want  of  proportion  is  like  the  genii  of  the  Arabian 
Nights,  found  in  a chest  by  a fisherman.  It  towers  to  the  sky  in 
an  instant  of  time.  It  is  a colossal,  chaotic  want  of  proportion 
which  sometimes  leads  him  to  sheer  absurdity.  With  a few  altera- 
62* 


I 


912 


THE  NATIONAL  REVIEW. 


tions  and  some  judicious  compression,  Les  Miserables  would  make 
an  excellent  harlequinade  ; but  it  would  be  impossible  to  represent 
the  Elective  affinities  at  the  Christmas  pantomime  in  any  form 
whatsoeyer.  This  is,  no  doubt,  a merit  on  the  negative  side.  And 
it  brings  us  to  our  final  conclusion  on  the  subject — namely,  that 
Goethe  was  the  greatest  amateur  who  ever  lived  ; gifted  with  the 
finest  intelligence  and  an  unlimited  curiosity,  he  passed  a long  life 
in  cultivating  himself  by  experience,  and  thought,  and  literature. 
His  works  were  his  notes  and  comments  on  the  way.  He  is  not  a 
craftsman  consumed  with  the  love  of  his  craft ; he  is  not,  properly 
speaking,  an  artist  at  all,  or  at  least,  if  he  was  an  artist,  it  was  in 
his  life  and  not  in  his  works.  Fq£  his  literary  work  was  a means, 
not  an  end ; and  it  fails  to  be  artistic  from  the  fact  of  its  having  so 
successfully  contributed  to  that  admirable  work  of  art  which  was 
his  life.  What  was  his  poetic  achievement?  To  put  it  as  briefly 
as  possible,  a metaphysical  poem  with  touches  of  pathos  and  song  ; 
a few  beautiful  songs  tinged  with  metaphysics.  Poets  say  that  he 
was  as  near  being  a poet  as  a man  of  science  can  be.  Men  of 
science  say  precisely  the  opposite — that  for  a poet  he  came  near 
being  one  of  them.  Goethe  is  thus  a striking  example  of  the  ars 
longa  vita  brevis  adage. 

“ The  lyfe  so  short,  the  craft  so  long  to  learn, 

The  assaye  so  hard,  so  sliarpe  the  conquering,” 

says  Chaucer. 

And  although  Goethe  lived  to  be  eighty  years  of  age,  life  was  too 
short  for  him  to  learn  the  craft,  the  assay  was  too  hard,  the  con- 
quering was  too  sharp. 

Even  Faust  is  but  a collection  of  the  fragments  written  at 
different  periods,  suggested  by  various  circumstances.  This  is  no 
doubt  the  way  to  write  interesting  literature,  but  it  is  not  the  way 
to  create  masterpieces  such  as  (Edipus , Macbeth , or  La  Divina 
Commedia.  And  it  must  be  remembered  that  it  is  with  Dante  and 
Shakespeare  that  Goethe  is  usually  placed. 

Should  it  be  asked,  however,  why,  if  Goethe’s  claims  to  supreme 
poetical  fame  are  slender,  his  reputation  as  a poet  is  so  great,  the 
answer  is  not  far  to  seek.  Goethe  is  famous  on  account  of  what  he 
was,  as  well  as  on  account  of  what  he  wrote  ; and  he  was  a great 
man,  a force,  a power ; the  dynamic  personality  of  the  man,  his 
life,  about  which  we  know  all,  have  made  an  impression  on  the 
century,  so  that  the  mind  of  the  world  bears  the  mark  and  impress 
of  his  personality  in  the  same  way  as  it  bears  the  stamp  of  men  of 
action,  and  politicians  such  as  Robespierre  and  Gladstone. 

Victor  Hugo,  on  the  other  hand,  although  possessing  nothing 
\ that  can,  properly  speaking,  be  called  intellect  at  all,  that  is  to  say 
| if  one  were  to  judge  solely  by  his  political  utterances,  his  general 


GOETHE  AND  VICTOR  HUGO:  A COMPARISON.  918 


conduct,  and  his  Works  of  criticism,  was  consumed  by  his  art, 
inspired  by  it,  caught  up  by  it  into  a Heaven  into  which  the 
luminous  intellect  of  Goethe  could  not  penetrate.  Goethe  is  no 
doubt  the  more  interesting  mind,  being  the  cleverest  of  men, 
although  it  is  surely  an  exaggeration  to  call  him  the  greatest 
of  all  critics. 

But  I maintain  that  if  a man  be  the  greatest  critic  in  the 
universe  and  the  profoundest  philosopher  into  the  bargain,  and  if 
he  chose  to  express  his  criticism  and  philosophy  in  poetry,  his 
poetry  must  still  be  judged  as  poetry,  and  such  a writer,  even  if  his 
verse  be  of  a high  level,  will  still  rank  below  a man,  neither  critic 
nor  philosopher,  who  expresses  his  mere  feelings  in  verse,  which 
having  no  pretention  to  anything  except  beauty,  is  more  inspired, 
more  artistic,  and  more  beautiful.  Goethe  was  a thinker , but  Victor 
Hugo  did  more  than  think,  he  saw. 

'{?) 


914 


MAKS  AS  A WORLD. 


During  the  early  months  of  last  year  many  astronomers  directed 
their  “ optic-tubes  ” to  the  ruddy  disc  of  Mars,  which  was  then 
conspicuously  visible  in  the  midnight  sky. ' The  planet  did  not 
approach  the  earth  so  closely  as  it  sometimes  does  in  its  periodical 
visitations,  but  it  was  high  above  the  horizon,  and  therefore  well 
situated  for  observation.  Startling  discoveries  were  scarcely 
•expected,  though  eager  eyes  were  strained  in  the  effort  to  dis- 
tinguish new  and  true  markings  on  the  Martian  face.  But  it 
is,  perhaps,  just  as  well  that  no  very  novel  characteristics  were 
observed ; for  the  absence  of  new  information  enables  fuller  con- 
sideration to  be  given  to  the  facts  already  available.  The  present 
thus  seems  an  appropriate  time  to  make  a general  survey  of  the 
planet’s  features,  and  to  describe  some  explanations  of  them  which 
have  recently  attracted  the  attention  of  astronomers. 

The  first  duty  of  a man  of  science  is  to  observe  accurately  and 
with  discrimination;  the  next,  to  interpret  his  contributions  to 
knowledge.  It  is,  however,  much  easier  to  develop  keenness  of 
perception  than  it  is  to  find  the  cause  of  the  phenomena  presented. 
A good  telescope,  a clear  atmosphere,  and  an  acute  observer,  will 
add  more  to  astronomical  knowledge  in  an  hour  than  can  be 
explained  in  a lifetime ; so  facts  accumulate  far  more  rapidly  than 
they  can  be  read.  Especially  is  this  the  case  in  celestial  matters. 
For  a long  time  the  general  features  of  the  planet  Mars  have  been 
known.  A comparatively  small  telescope  shows  that  more  than 
half  the  surface  is  made  up  of  extensive  regions  of  a reddish-yellow 
tint,  while  the  remainder  consists  of  darker  blue-green  patches  and 
two  white  “ caps  ” around  the  poles.  Arguing  from  analogy  with 
the  earth,  the  light  and  dark  markings  which  constitute  n. 
tenths  of  the  area  of  Mars  are  held  to  represent  land  and  water. 
But  which  is  land  and  which  is  water  cannot  yet  be  definitely 
determined,  though  the  general  opinion  is  that  the  darker  portions 
of  the  surface  represent  Martian  oceans  and  the  lighter  areas 
land. 

The  Polar  Regions. 

The  nature  of  the  polar  caps  is  known  with  a high  degree  of 
probability.  As  the  summer  advances  in  the  northern  hemisphere 


